Tuesday...HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!...we set off at 7:30 to head to South Africa! On route we saw loads of Kuda, Oryx and springbok running across the road and jumping the fence, one spingbok panicked and just ran into the fence! We got our first glimpse of a winery, weird to see miles of green vines after spending a week in the desert, there were thousands of huts alongside the winery where all the farmers live. We crossed the border and arrived at our camp on Orange River at noon. We spent the afternoon chilling and swimming in the river and the evening was filled with flunky ball! We played against another G adventures group on camp who have come up from Cape Town and heading to Livingstone, we obviously won as we are pros by now! Laura was nicknamed 'sniper' as she hit the bottle 3 times!!! For tea we had Springbok steak - yummers, and we spent another night sleeping under the stars!

Wednesday we set off at 7:00 heading further south to Cederberg. We camped at a vine yard where we got to do wine tasting, we tasted 3 reds, 1 white, 2 rose and 1 sparkling wine with a cheese board which accompanied one of the reds, the parents would have loved it! We had dinner, last meal cooked by colleen and Lezinda, then an early night, last night in our tents!!!

Thursday we set off for our last drive in our wonderful truck 'Zambezi' at 7:00 towards our final destination Cape Town! It was so beautiful driving through the wine lands with the Cederberg mountains in the distance. We arrived at Cape Town early so we were able to spend the afternoon climbing table mountain, a 1hr 45min hike up rocks (more of a vertical climb than Kill!!!) the view from the stop was stunning! We all went out for a last meal together & we had to say goodbye to Toby and Mathias as they were flying out straight away.

Friday we all met for breakfast & said goodbye to Shane and Kieran. The rest of us set off on a day trip at 8:30, our first stop was Hout Bay where we caught a boat across to Seal Island, it was so windy and the waves were huge! Definitely thought we were going to capsize!!! The seals were awesome, there was hundreds of them swimming and sunbathing on the island. After we were safely back to land we drove to Boulder Beach where we got to see the African penguins, they were cute and it was funny watching them waddle along. Next we drove to Cape Point National Park where we swapped onto bicycles, we cycled along to the tourist centre, it would have been a lovely bike ride however again it was so windy it felt the bike was going to blow out from underneath you! Ben thought it was wicked but Laura was scared sh*tless!!! We had lunch then got back onto the safety of our minibus which took us to the Lighthouse, the views were very beautiful from the top, then we had photos by the Cape of Hope sign. A Chinese woman asked Laura where the line was that the 2 oceans meet so Laura had to try to explain that there is no line and that the water just merges, she looked very disappointed!! We hoped back on our bus and slept the whole way back to the hotel.

Saturday we had a lie in, everyone was pretty much doing their own things today so we decided to do the hop on hop off bus. We got a map and some headphones, 2 stops into the trip we realised we were on the wrong route which meant we had to do the same route twice! Woops! We got off at Camps Bay, a really beautiful beach sorounded by mansions! We sat on the beach and ate some breakfast we bought from the supermarket. We also stopped at the V&A Waterfront where we had a nice stroll around the fancy restraunts and shops. Next we stopped at a vine yard and did yet another wine tasting session! It was 20 mins until our next bus so there was no messing around we did a quick sniff and glug of all 10 wines then ran for the bus!!! We ended our bus tour at long street so strolled around green square market. We all met up for dinner to discuss what we did for the day then headed to bed as we had an early start planned for the next day!

Sunday we set off at 5:30 for our day of shark diving! We were all so tired so slept on the 2 hour drive to our diving spot, on route our driver pulled in at Hermanus Bay, a popular whale watching spot this time of year, and we could see a couple of whales just off the coast which was cool. When we reached our diving spot we had a really nice breakfast and a safety briefing, we were warned that unfortunately the shark sightings have been slow the last two weeks and for the past 2 days boats have come back without seeing any! We set off on our boat which was very bumpy at first but smoothed off after a while, Laura was obviously frightened to death again and announced to Ben that after seasickness on the bumpy Zanzibar ferry, white water rafting, sitting in tiny wabbley mikoros and now shark diving that she was finally done with water based activities he kindly reminded her that we booked a week long scuba diving course!!! We sailed for about 10 mins then set anchor and dropped the diving cage, we waited for about 45 minutes until our shark appeared, was very cool! Unfortunately we did just see the 1 shark and it only appeared to the surface 4 times and was not seen at all under water by anyone in a cage however we all still had a go at getting in the cage and had some photos... The water was freezing!! We slept the whole 2 hours back + stopping again to see whales, then headed out for sushi. Good job we chose sushi for dinner as the city had a powercut, we ate our sushi in candle light, our last meal together! After dinner we said goodbye to Ling and Adrienne, which sucked! Had the best time with those guys!!!

Monday....HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM!...its time to leave cape town :( we have loved it here! We spent the morning just packing our bags then caught a cab at 10 to the airport. We, us + Mary, flew to Johannesburg at 13:15 with South African Airlines, which were better than we thought. As soon as we arrived at our hostel we caught a cab to Hard Rock Cafe so Laura could add another glass to her collection! Yippee! After dinner we just headed back to the hostel and had an early night.

Tuesday we had a amazing lie in! We spent the day chilling and sorting through our photos whilst Mary went to the museum. We went to the airport at 17:00...time to leave Africa...Its been great!!!!